Virgin Australia crew lose pillow fight over allowances at LA hotels

Virgin Australia flight attendants have lost their long-running pillow fight over allowances, which started when management switched swanky hotels in Los Angeles for their overnight stays.

During the two-year saga, the industrial umpire has had to contend with a long list of questions such as whether long-haul flight attendants should pocket more in allowances for room service and meals than pilots.

The tussle had its genesis in 2013 when Virgin's contract to accommodate flight crew at the Hilton in Long Beach ended and the airline chose the Marriott Hotel, a short drive from shopping centres in San Fernando Valley, for their overnight stays after marathon flights from Australia.

To the chagrin of flight attendants, Virgin advised them at the time that it would cut their daily allowance from $US183.32 to $US150 from October 2013, using a calculation named after its workplace relations manager, Nick Le Mare. It subsequently became known as the Le Mare methodology.

The cut to allowances sparked an outcry from the flight attendants' union, which took the matter to the Fair Work Commission where it argued Virgin had made a big mistake in the way it calculated the allowances.

The Flight Attendants' Association of Australia asserted in its claim that there was a lack of places to eat near the Marriott in San Fernando Valley between 11pm and 6am.

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The union said this meant that flight attendants would have to use room service for meals and that the airline's methodology for calculating allowances was not enough to cater for this.

The union also highlighted that Virgin's calculation did not take into account the cost of hiring taxis to travel to restaurants and that the allowance of $US183.32 should be reinstated.

However, the airline was steadfast in saying that its calculation for a $US150 allowance was correct and more than sufficient for a layover in the City of Angels.

In a judgment in favour of Virgin, a Fair Work commissioner has pointed out that it would be unlikely that any alternative methodology would result in cabin crew gaining higher international allowances than pilots.

"As may be alternatively expressed in blunt but easily understood language; what basis could there conceivably be for flight attendants to be paid higher allowances than those paid to pilots?" the commissioner wrote.

While conceding there might be fewer dining options late at night or in the early hours, the commissioner said that it was a "predictable problem inherently associated with accommodation arrangements for international flight crews on layovers in foreign ports".

As such, the commissioner said Virgin's methodology was a way to broadly compensate for the predictable costs and inconvenience of overnight stays in far-flung destinations.

Fair Work, ultimately, found that the union had failed to make a case to alter Virgin management's decision to settle on an allowance of $US150 a night, and the case was closed.